Latest News

Russian MoD slams US DoD: "Mosul claims completely absurd"

April 2nd, 2017 - Fort Russ News -

- Al Mayadeen - - translated by Samer Hussein -

On Sunday, the Russian Ministry of Defense, responded to the statements, previously made by the US Department of Defense about the number of civilian casualties during the US-led counter-terrorist operation in Mosul.

A spokesman for the Russian Ministry of Defense, Major General Igor Konashenkov, said the US DOD statements on civilian casualties in Mosul are completely absurd and are in a way justifying the civilian casualties for the sake of destroying the terrorist targets. He noted that US-led coalition forces should have taken into account the possible number of civilian death that might occur during such negligent operations.

Konashenkov recalled a statement from Joseph Skeroka, a spokesman for the international coalition led by the United States, in which the latter spoke about declassifying a video clip, showing how the gunmen are holding civilians in a building in western Mosul, in order to provoke the US-led coalition strike and called it a tool to justify the actions, done by the coalition forces.

Konashenkov noted that such moves are “ridiculous” and raise questions about why the coalition forces do not carry out their operations with necessary precision that would annihilate the terrorist targets, but minimize the civilian casualties.

He also compared the situation in Mosul to that in Aleppo where no Russian Air Force was used as the operations were focused on creating the humanitarian corridors and other means of assistance to the besieged civilian population and stated that the US-led coalition forces should have done the same in Mosul, rather than indiscriminately bombing the city. He added that it is therefore not possible to talk about the US operations in Mosul as being “humanitarian”.

He further went on saying, "There is a difference between the Russian style of operations in Aleppo and that of the US in Mosul, as the Russian operations prioritized the humanitarian issues."

"What are the motives of American leadership to hide the war crimes, committed by terrorists away from the international public, that is the most important question here”, he was heard saying in the end.